Zizzi's! (Take Three)

Food posts are back and they are back with a vengeance! I've got a few from the last few months when I went out to eat but was posting blog posts on 'the 12 days of eyemas'. I went to Zizzi's at the beginning of December when my mum came to visit me in Notts. We had a great day wandering around the Christmas market and doing a spot of shopping which ended with a delicious meal.

For starter we shared the aranchini balls and the calamari. The aranchini are risotto balls with mozzarella and peas breadcrumbed to make it crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. It was served with a chunky tomato dip which was really tasty and went really well with both of the dishes. The balls were delicious and even thinking about this is making me want to eat my laptop screen. They had so much flavour and weren't too heavy considering it's essentially fried balls of creamy rice. I always go for calamari when it's on the menu and it has to be one of my favourite starters. I was very impressed with these beautiful rings of squid. They were crispy on the outside and really soft when I bit into it, not chewy at all. It was served with a garlic and basil aioli and that was really tasty and went well with both the aranchini balls and the calamari. Delicious! Good choices all round.

I wasn't really fancying a pasta dish so I went for chicken with parma ham and sage, tuscan potatoes and green beans in a white wine sauce. I liked this a lot but it didn't blow me away. The chicken had lots of flavour but the ham was a bit something or nothing. The green beans were cooked nicely and the sauce had a nice flavour but I'd have liked it to have been a bit thicker and creamier. I like the edges of the potatoes where they were really crispy but I'm really fussy when it comes to potatoes and I pretty much only like them if they're burnt to a crisp. So I liked the dish but I just didn't love it.